derailed
by fuzzyvonpretty
Summary: But he talks. He listens. He looks. He stares. He texts. He calls. He touches. He tells her everything, no matter how mundane. Meredith finds herself spacing out at the nurse's station.
1. Chapter 1

Meredith is spacing out by the third-floor nurses' station again.

It's not spacing out as much as she is being overwhelmed by sense and memory.

For the longest time, when this happened to her, it was about Derek. Her widow's heart would seize up thinking she saw him in the corridor or whenever she vividly remembered his eyes smiling at her across the pillow. The sharp pain of those moments dulled over time, but never disappeared; it became a sort of dull ache.

She feels just the slightest bit guilty that when this happens to her now, Derek is the furthest thing from her mind. She's having _thoughts_– intrusive, day-derailing _thoughts _that are keeping her from being fully plugged into conversations. Even work-related thoughts are getting derailed, and that hasn't happened since the early years with Derek.

She's chewing on the end of her pen, staring at Andrew DeLuca while he does paperwork.

She's amazed, actually. It's rare you can stare at someone this long and not have them do something that would embarrass them if they knew. By now, anyone else would have picked their nose, bit their nails, or made some face, and the spell would have been broken.

But Andrew is all focus and drive. And that's what's _really _getting her going. He's dedicated, and hardworking, and intelligent, and handsome, and kind, and absolutely _amazing _in bed.

She can't look at him without thinking about his breath against her ear while they are both seconds from orgasm and he quietly moans her name.

She can't look at him without thinking of when he took her while she was doing the dishes after dinner, resulting in one smashed plate, a pile of pasta on the floor, and a small hickey on the back of her neck that made ponytails out of the question for three days.

She can't look at him without remembering when they were driving to her house after work and didn't make it all the way there, because before they could, she slammed on the brakes, pulled the car over into an loading zone, flipped on the hazard lights, and jumped him right there in the passenger's seat.

"Mere. Earth to Mere." She looks up from her zone – she'd done it _again _– to find Alex standing in front of her. "The Waverly kid? Have you had a look at his chart?"

Meredith snaps back in. She remembers reading it, she knows what to say. She tells Alex what she was thinking, and Alex agrees with her on a plan of action. By this point, Andrew has finished whatever it is he was working on and is walking toward the nurse's station. Watching him walk would probably put her back into the zone, so she snaps her head down to browse the file she was looking it.

"Hey, Chief," he says, and Alex says hey back. Meredith knows that any curtness, any bluntness, any attitude on Alex's part is just residual shame; it's nothing Andrew should take personally, and bless him, he doesn't seem to.

Andrew and Alex hold a conversation for a few moments, and before Meredith re-enters the zone, she decides to get up and head to the coffee cart. She's seeing Andrew tonight, and she needs to concentrate.

As she gets up, she smiles at him; not a secretive smile, not an ear-to-ear grin, but an acknowledgement that she'd seen him. That's one of the best parts of being with Andrew: the near-constant communication. Physical, emotional, verbal – she feels like, issues with his father aside, that they are constantly communicating. It's new for her, which makes it both overwhelming and scary, but it's also helping to bind them together and scratch open parts of herself that she'd thought she'd buried with Derek.

All of her previous relationships – even with the love of her life – were characterized by miscommunication and things left unsaid. She knows that these men had their shortcomings.

She knows she does too. She's more emotionally open than she used to be, but she knows she has more to learn.

Andrew, on the other hand, has _different _shortcomings – he has a tendency toward impatience, he insists on telling her every single part of his day (she vacillates between finding it sweet and finding it endlessly irritating), and he's _so damn cocky _– but he talks. He listens. He looks. He stares. He texts. He calls. He touches. He tells her everything, no matter how mundane.

So she goes about the rest of her day, knowing she will at one point get a text from him asking how her day is going. She might run into him in the cafeteria while she's eating lunch and he'll ask after Bailey's cold or Zola's homework. She'll do her work, and he'll always be communicating.

So when she leaves work to go pick up the kids from daycare and their after-school activities, she's surprised to not have a text from Andrew asking about their plans for the evening. She figures he's in surgery, or busy with patients, or working in the lab, so she lets it go. She helps the kids with their homework, reheats something Tanya put in the fridge for dinner, and gives Ellis a bath before she thinks to check her phone again. Still nothing. This is extremely unlike him, but somehow she doesn't feel worried.

After tucking Ellis in and making sure Bailey and Zola are heading for bed, Meredith takes her youngest as inspiration and goes to draw herself a bath, thinking about the tightness in her upper back from a long surgery yesterday. She's in her robe, about to untie it, when a thought strikes her.

It is incredibly weird that she hasn't heard from Andrew.

She shoots him a quick text, asking if he's still planning to come over tonight.

She feels a little bubble of anxiety forming. Communication has not been their issue. She's been thinking all day about how great it is that they _do_ communicate. Could she have fucked up something so simple?

Before she gets to deep into the anxiety bubble, her phone buzzes. He's about to be on his way. Meredith exhales, not realizing how shallowly she's been breathing for the last few minutes. She goes to the tub and begins to fill it, adding lavender and bergamot.

He comes to the door just as the tub finishes filling, and Meredith runs down to answer it – messy hair, bathrobe, and all. His expression is unreadable and she's still not sure what's going on.

"Hey," she breathes as she opens the door.

Andrew makes his way through, backpack in one hand. "Hey." He seems tense, maybe angry, but also maybe just stressed. Meredith isn't sure how to get through to him.

"Are you okay?" She's looking at him, and he's having trouble meeting her eyes.

He launches right in, which Meredith appreciates. No dancing around the subject – he's upset and he wants her to know why. "I didn't walk over to you earlier to talk to the Chief, Meredith. I walked over to talk to you, because I was having a shitty day, and then you got up and left." Meredith's stomach sinks a little bit. Her coy smile didn't communicate what she wanted it to.

"And then, I didn't hear from you all day. I know, it's usually me, but I would have loved to hear from you. Just once. Nothing crazy."

She knows she's new at this. She and Derek had two volumes – quiet and full blast. Arguments were always full blast. Love was always full blast. She's not accustomed to someone who's on a broader emotional spectrum.

"Andrew, I'm sorry. I'm – not great at this," she says, by way of an explanation.

"I know. And I don't want to be clingy or smothering, I know you have a life. I know you have to take care of more than just yourself." He exhales and grabs for her hand, and meets her eyes. "It's okay that you're not great at it, but I kind of… want more?" Meredith's chest squeezes a little bit and she feels the panic rise. "Not a lot more. I know I talk a lot and I'm always in my feelings, and that's not you and I wouldn't want it to be. And you don't have a ton of space and time for me, so maybe I shouldn't want anything, or I shouldn't ask. But I care about you, Meredith, and I want this to work."

"So what do you need, Andrew?" She doesn't mean to sound angry, or petty, or mean. It hurts her – maybe more than she would think – that he feels like she isn't there for him, so she honestly wants to know how to do that. Cece was right that she needed to open herself up, and Meredith is starting to realize that she didn't just mean in terms of experiences and emotions. She meant open to _change_. She needs to avoid the stagnation that threatened her life as a widow – she could win all the awards, raise amazing kids, and be happy, but she was at constant risk of being the same person she had been since Derek died – emotionally stunted, closed-off, afraid.

She needs to evolve, and she knows this. And Andrew is pushing her to. And she doesn't hate it.

He strokes over the knuckles on her hand. "Just… be there more? For me? I feel weird always being the one texting or calling."

Meredith nods. "Happy to."

"And no more Cheshire-cat smiles at the nurse's station without actually talking to me."

Meredith laughs at that. "You might actually like my reason for that."

Andrew cocks an eyebrow. "Really, now?"

"Really," Meredith responds. "I was thinking about that time in my car in that loading zone on Mercer Street, and I knew if I stared at you any longer, or started talking to you, I wouldn't get any work done." She looks up at Andrew and the tightly-knit brow has been replaced by a smirk.

"Dr. Grey, are you telling me you weren't being entirely professional in the workplace?"

Meredith grins. "Dr. DeLuca, I was not being _at all _professional. And in the interest of full disclosure, you should know that I was also thinking about that time by the kitchen sink."

Meredith hears a low groan from the back of Andrew's throat as he backs her into the wall of the foyer. His backpack drops from his hand and his hands come up to Meredith's waist as he furiously kisses her.

"Oh, and Andrew," she breaks in, pushing lightly on his chest, "I was worried about you, so I drew us a bath."

"I should make you worry more often," he purrs, pressing kisses to her neck.

Meredith is loath to pull away, but knows it's a temporary breach. She takes him by the hand and leads him up the stairs to her bedroom, where she pulls off his clothes and unties her robe. He reaches for her, but she's serious about the bath. She watches him, all muscle and sun-kissed skin and firm, straight lines, as he gets into the tub, and she follows after.

He's reclining against the back of the tub, and she's in his arms against his chest. She hears his heartbeat under her and feels the stress and anxiety seep out – both from herself and from him.

She thinks about what he wants. She needs to be there more. So, she figures, there's no time like the present.

"How was your day?" Andrew's head is tilted back and his eyes are closed, but she sees the ghost of a smile.

"You don't ask me that all that often," he murmurs, pressing a kiss to her forehead.

"Well, I'm being here," she responds.

So Andrew tells her about his day – the patient he lost in the ER, the argument he had with another patient's parents, and the experiment in the lab that he screwed up for the fifth day in a row. Meredith takes this all in, knowing that, mostly, Andrew just needs to let it out. She rubs her right hand over his chest as she talks, enjoying the heat and the firmness and the closeness. The water is rocking them lightly, and she's enjoy the slip and slide of her skin against his.

Despite their confrontation before – minor as it might have been – Meredith feels a sea change, or something close to it, in their relationship. The needs they've discussed until now have been sexual. Emotional. Personal. They haven't been things required of the other person.

Andrew felt comfortable asking her to give more. She felt comfortable offering it up to him. She's marveling, much as she did before, at the symbiosis and balance and ease of this relationship, and how these things are helping her evolve.

Andrew's finished talking about his day, and he asks about Meredith.

"Well," she begins, quietly, "mostly, all I could think about was you."

Andrew laughs, a low rumble she feels as much as hears. "Tell me more."

"Remember when you pushed up against me while I was doing the dishes? You stripped my pants and underwear down in two seconds flat and were inside me after five. I almost blacked out, you made me come so hard." Meredith hears a sharp intake of breath. "I just kept thinking about that, and how good you felt, and how loudly I screamed when I came." Andrew moans, and she knows she's getting to him. "Well, you wanted me to communicate."

Andrew lifts her up, stands, and carries her to the bed. "Meredith Grey, your communication skills are unparalleled." And those are the last words they speak before tumbling into a pile of wandering hands and mouths, of slippery skin and sharp cries.

Meredith knows the Derek-shaped hole in her heart will always be there. She will always miss him, love him, and cherish him. But now she knows – her caring, her love, her needs did not die with him.

She looks up at Andrew as he presses into her, fingers wound together against the bedspread. Her heart is cracked open, but rather than bleeding out, it's taking it in – love, joy, pleasure. She feels her heart clench as he looks at her, worshipfully, lovingly – and feels warmth spread through her. She feels the delicious friction when he weaves a hand through her hair and her back arches to meet him.

It's several hours later, when they're thoroughly spent and relaxing on the bed – her propped up on her elbow, him facing her with his head resting against her hip – that she realizes her day-derailing thoughts aren't the problem she thought they were.

The problem is, she thinks she might be falling in love again.

And worse than that, she might want to.


	2. Chapter 2

f Andrew is honest with himself, he knows he's in love with Meredith Grey, and he has been for some time. He feels an overwhelming need to be with her, to talk to her, to know her, all the time. It's not interfering with work – he thinks.

That said, it is excruciating to be in love with someone you barely know.

That's a lie. He knows Meredith. He knows her likes and dislikes, her family story, her background. He knows exactly how she wakes up in the morning and how she takes her coffee. He knows that when she's on the brink, her lower back convulses and her eyes open wide and look directly at him and it unnerves him – it's such a gesture of openness that he's not accustomed to from Meredith.

That's the nexus of his major problem: she is just not as… open? Yeah, open. She's not as open with him as he is with her. He understands there are reasons for that, good reasons, important reasons, devastating reasons, but it makes it so hard to feel like he's in a real, grown-up relationship. He doesn't know _why_ she does certain things – why she never calls or texts, why she never really takes initiative. The dark, moody part of him – the part he blames on his father – feels like it's because he's not worth caring about. The rational side knows the reasons and tries to accept them, but as he falls harder and harder for her, it's harder to ignore the darkness.

So he's at work, still getting past this mess with his father. He lost a patient this morning – a woman in a car accident who was talking when she came in and dead two hours later – and had the parents of a kid yell at him because he forgot the dad's name. James, not John. If he had been in a better mood, he would have laughed it off because that was stupid as hell, but in the mood he's in, it just serves to make him feel like a shitty doctor and a shitty person.

And Meredith still hasn't texted.

He's sitting in the lab, screwing up this experiment he's doing for Dr. Shepherd for the fifth day running (though Dr. Shepherd told him he needed to screw up a bunch of times to know how to do it right), when he's finally had it. He needs to go do something low-stakes and low-risk.

That's how he ends up by the third-floor nurses' station, signing charts and reviewing orders. He sees Meredith out of the corner of his eye. It's been a few days since they last really saw each other – since then it's been hands touching in hallways and one brief on-call room kiss. And, of course, she hasn't really texted or called. He sends her messages in the morning, the afternoon, and at night; she responds, but doesn't really engage.

He sees Alex walk over to Meredith and figures that's his entrance. Alex can't be rude to him; there's too much tortured history and they both care too much about Meredith's happiness.

He meanders over, starts asking Alex about a patient from earlier; he's helpful and gives him the chance to scrub in, a chance he appreciates since he got kicked off that pancreatectomy case a few weeks ago.

But before he even gets a chance to talk to Meredith – before he can make eye contact – she gets up, smiles in his direction, and walks away.

He knows it's petty. He knows it's stupid. But in his mind, he feels a little atomic bomb go off. She doesn't want to get to know him. She doesn't want to make small talk. Maybe she really is using him. Maybe he's not worth being in a relationship with. She'll never carve out a space in her life for him; he is extraneous, he is supplemental, he is not needed.

He finishes his chat with Alex and retreats back to the lab. If she's not going to talk to him, and if his mood gets any blacker, he really shouldn't be dealing with patients.

He's cursing at a computer program a few hours later when Amelia walks in.

"Dr. Shepherd, hi." He's trying to be cool. This is Meredith's sister. This is her husband's sister. This is Meredith's _family_.

"Hey, DeLuca. How's it going?"

He lets out a long exhale. "I've been screwing up, like you asked." Amelia laughs at that.

"It's okay, DeLuca. Not one resident in a million would get this on the first… million tries. I have faith in you. Keep at it."

He lets out an exasperated noise.

"DeLuca, everything all right?" Amelia's brow knits and when he looks at her, he sees concern in her eyes.

"Crappy day." He doesn't want to say any more – he doesn't want her to know how fucking _lame_ and _insecure_ he's feeling.

Amelia pulls up a chair and sits next to him. "Is it your dad?"

Andrew shakes his head. It is and it isn't. "Seriously, Dr. Shepherd, just having a crappy day."

Amelia raises one brow – Andrew fears she's got some kind of spidey sense for drama.

"Is this about Meredith?"

Andrew feels trapped. "No, no, no, no – of course not. Just – you know – I lost a patient, and had an argument, and this experiment…"

Amelia interrupts him. "Yeah, yeah, yeah. You have a look on your face like my sister is giving you acid reflux. Fess up, Andrew."

She only ever calls him Andrew when she's being really nice to him. After her surgery. When he was sleeping on her sister's couch. When he got beat. At Jo's wedding.

He decides he won't hit the nail on the head. "Just – you know – sometimes I feel like I want too much."

Amelia gives him a tiny smile. "And Meredith isn't really in the business of giving… well, much."

It gives him a tiny bit of relief to know that Amelia feels that way. "Is there, like, a shortcut to figure that out?"

Amelia laughs at that. "Of course not, DeLuca. You're dating my sister. I'm giving you clues, not a roadmap."

Andrew knows, realistically, that a woman who spends as much time with him as Meredith does is not doing it out of the goodness of her heart. She's doing it because she wants to. But he still can't shake the feeling like it's him – he's doing something wrong, or he's committed the cardinal sin of not being her husband.

"Dr. Shepherd?" Amelia has been staring into space for a minute or so, but she looks at him as though her train of thought was never elsewhere. "I just…. How do I know this isn't a fling? How do I know she actually, you know, feels invested?"

Amelia's eyes narrow for a second, and he's hoping it's that she's thinking – not that she's considering ratting him out.

"Meredith has been through a lot. It's hard for her to get close to people. You know that, Andrew." She could be scolding him, but she isn't. "Meredith has had more misplaced trust than most people, and also more loss than most. You'll have to give her the benefit of the doubt."

Andrew knows this, but it's helpful to hear it from someone else. "And how will I know when she's actually decided to trust me?"

Amelia laughs, again, a kind of bittersweet laugh. "You'll have to let me know." With that, she stands up, pushing her chair back in. She puts a hand on Andrew's shoulder. "You're good for her, Andrew. Don't be afraid to push a little. Not a lot, a little." She squeezes the hand on his shoulder, then heads for the door. Before twisting the nob, she turns around and gives him an inscrutable look. "We never talked about this, you know." And before Andrew can respond, the door is closing behind her.

He stays staring at the door for awhile. Amelia knows Meredith, maybe not as well as her other friends, but she knows her. He feels like he can take her at her word. A little bit of the black cloud hanging over his day has lifted. He's still not ready to make the effort; he's still not ready to bring it up; but he can sit and think about it, and maybe screw up this experiment more while he's at it.

A few hours pass, and he looks toward the window – the sun has almost fully set, and his brain clicks on – he's hungry. He gets up and heads for the cafeteria, knowing that food will likely solve most of his current problems.

He's munching on his dinner in the resident's lounge when his phone vibrates in his pocket. He assumes it's Carina – she's the only one that ever texts him – and he's shocked to see a text from Meredith, asking if he's still planning on coming over.

His brain kicks into overdrive. If she's texting him, she must want him there, right? She's not texting him to break up with him?

His next thought comes with a side of anger. Why is he having this conversation with himself? Why is he parsing her text like a high schooler? Why can't he take her words at face value? He's at angry at himself for being childish as he is at her for not communicating.

Rather than stew, he knows he has to talk to her. He texts her back, lets her know that he'll be on his way soon. He quickly changes and grabs his bag. He knows he should probably take a cab – he's definitely not focused enough to get on his bike right now.

The familiar road to Meredith's house stretches for what seems like eternity. He's still not one hundred percent sure what he's going to say. Does he tell her he's pissed? Does he tell her he doesn't think she cares? Does he tell her that he's insecure as fuck and she's better off pining for her dead husband?

He chastises himself – that's not fair to her. He does need to be honest, though. He's good with feelings, but it's never been this hard for him to tell the truth.

When the car pulls up to Meredith's house, he's still unsure. He can't school his face into passivity; he knows he's going to look upset regardless. He gently knocks on the door and is greeted, almost immediately, by a robe-clad Meredith. His anger seems to evaporate and when he sees her he can't think of anything but how happy he is to be in her presence.

Luckily, his face and his voice don't catch up to his brain. He's gruff, and can't make eye contact, mostly because it's going to murder his willpower if he does anything else. When she asks what's wrong, it spills out. How he feels her avoiding him. How she never asks him how he's doing. How she never communicates. He's trying to avoid it sounding like a laundry list of grievances, but he knows that if _he _wants this to work – and more importantly, if _she _does – he just has to tell her how he's feeling.

She's clearly thrown off by what he says, and he instantly feels guilty. Who is he to push in like this? Who is he to be worthy of her thoughts, her affection?

When she says she's sorry, he can't take it. His eyes meet hers and he feels, suddenly, so much better. Even the word vomit he's spewing about his feelings and emotions and needs – it all seems so insignificant.

"So what do you need, Andrew?"

He takes a minute to process and think. What he needs is her – all of her. He needs her to try for him and to talk to him and to keep him close and to never, ever leave him. But all of that sounds intense and ridiculous, and he doesn't want to freak her out, so all he says is, "Just… be there more? For me? I feel weird always being the one texting or calling." Even that sounds pathetic to his ears, but she smiles and nods and squeezes his hand – somehow, she ended up holding his hands, though he doesn't remember how.

"Happy to."

"And no more Cheshire-cat smiles at the nurse's station without actually talking to me."

Meredith laughs and suddenly the spell is broken. His anger melts away.

"I was thinking about that time in my car in that loading zone on Mercer Street, and I knew if I stared at you any longer, or started talking to you, I wouldn't get any work done."

Andrew is amazed at his male brain – he's gone from angry to incredibly turned on in probably under a minute. His highlight reel of that particular moment starts to play and all he can think about is pulling off that robe.

But he can't be _that_ much of a cad. "Dr. Grey, are you telling me you weren't being entirely professional in the workplace?"

Meredith smiles back at him. "Dr. DeLuca, I was not being _at all _professional. And in the interest of full disclosure, you should know that I was also thinking about that time by the kitchen sink."

He short-circuits, and next thing he knows he's pushed her up against the foyer wall, his hands scrabbling at her waist and all he can think is _Sex. Now. Right now_.

"I was worried about you, so I drew us a bath." Andrew knows he has to control himself. She was thinking about him. She did something to show she cared and wanted to be with him; the least he could do is respect that without acting, again, like an immature teenager with zero self-control.

She leads him upstairs and undresses him, and he's more turned on than he thought possible. She sheds her robe and he's this close to taking all of his well-earned, well-built control and throwing it out the window to ravage her. She evades his grasp and pulls him into the tub with her.

Andrew's deep, dark secret is that he _loves _the bath. Alone or with someone else. There's something about the rocking of the water and the heat that just puts him at ease. He remembers being in the tub at home in Rome when he was just a little kid, the one time he could be alone in the quiet without screaming parents or fights with his sister. It's always been his happy, soothing place.

Meredith is lying in his arms, and he'd be lying if he said he weren't keeping an eye on whether or not he could see certain… salient details in the water. But Meredith, as always, throws him for a loop.

"How was your day?"

Andrew is touched, and pleased, and vindicated, and he tells her so – not in so many words. He talks about his patient in the pit, the family he argued with – he's finally able to laugh about it – and the experiment he's screwing up for her sister. He can tell she's listening, but she just lets him talk; he wonders again, for the hundredth time, how he got this lucky.

When he asks about her, she throws him for a loop – again.

"Mostly, all I could think about was you."

He laughs, but the turned-on part of his brain lights back up, and he knows his self-control is flagging – they're naked, in water, and the heat has made him a little light-headed and dreamy. "Tell me more."

"Remember when you pushed up against me while I was doing the dishes? You stripped my pants and underwear down in two seconds flat and were inside me after five. I almost blacked out, you made me come so hard." Andrew swears he can't breathe. "I just kept thinking about that, and how good you felt, and how loudly I screamed when I came."

And just like that, his self-control completely evaporates.

"Well, you wanted me to communicate."

He's done, cooked, fried, ready to go. "Meredith Grey, your communication skills are unparalleled." And with that, he picks her up and delicately places her on the bed before covering her with his body and binding himself to her for as long as possible.

He knows he's in love with her, and it takes all of his willpower to not say it to her right now. So he does everything he can to _show _the depth of how he feels – with his lips, with his tongue, with his eyes, with his hands. She falls, repeatedly, staring into his eyes each time. He feels her hands squeeze his own and he knows he can't keep it to himself much longer. He loves her.

And if she can tell by the way he's looking at her, then all the better.

At one point, she's moving over him, her blond hair static-y and flying everywhere, her cheeks pink, her eyes wild, and she leans down and crushes her lips to his, eyes open, left hand grasping his face and right anchoring to his hip. He knows she's feeling something; maybe it's not love, but it could be, one day.

When the evening is winding down and he's lying with his head on her hip while her free hand plays with his hair, he looks up to see her staring at him. Her eyes are soft and the corners of her lips are turned up; he could swear she wants to say something.

But all she says is, "Let's get ready for bed. I've got a meeting in the morning and you should probably leave early."

He feels his heart sink, just a tiny bit, but he relishes the thought of sleeping next to her. After she gets ready for bed and crawls in, he envelops her in his arms, their still-damp skin sticking his chest and her back together.

It is not time yet, he knows. He can't go from one emotional extreme to another in a day; that's his father's department. But for now, he will settle for a night with Meredith in his arms, waiting for the light of day to break the spell.


End file.
